December 2022 Budget

So this is the last blog of 2022 and it's definitely been an 'interesting' year to say the least.  I guess it's sort of fitting that my last blog is a financial one, seeing as everything has been about finances this year.  The December's budget went better than I was expecting seeing as Christmas was involved and having our Christmas sinking fund definitely helped with that.  This fund is something we'll look to build up again next year.

Apart from one week we've actually been pretty good when it came to spending on groceries and eating out.  It shows that we can do it just fine and I plan on carrying that on to next year as well.

In November we did have to do quite a bit of spending on the car which ultimately led to us having to get a new second hand car.  This time we had to get the car on finance, which we'll need to factor into our budgets over the next few years.  This month has been much better when it comes to the car and we did get our car tax for the previous car back again, which I put straight back into our car repairs sinking fund.  This month hasn't really been the best month to determine how much we're going to save on fuel with our hybrid car, so it will be interesting to see that in the future.  Another positive is that I managed to pay a full year of my pension in, the first time I've been able to do that - go me!

Our spending has also been pretty good this month, but probably because we've been so busy sorting out other things as well as presents for other people that we haven't had a chance to spend on ourselves.  Looking back over the year it's pretty obvious that we not particularly good on that front so that's something we'll need to think about budgeting next year as well.

We're also ending the year with no credit card debt and our own emergency funds still in order so I'm very happy about that.  Unfortunately the four months saving didn't exactly go to plan, but at least the money was there when we needed it which is kind of the point of it in the first place.

And that's it.  This year has definitely shown us how important having the sinking funds and savings have been when it comes to helping make things less stressful.  This adds a bit more of an incentive to get them back up and running next year so that we're ready for the next set of problems, or hopefully just reading for Christmas 23.  

Happy New Year everyone.

November 2022 Budget

November has been a pretty pricey month, mostly because we have done a whole lot of Christmas shopping and have had to get a new car after a few problems with the old car, including a breakdown.  Thankfully we do have sinking funds for these, but it's still unpleasant watching them go down.  Probably because I know we will have to build them back up again.

Of course, if we're being honest, we have also spent more than we should in other areas - like things for the flat from charity shops and IKEA.  I also brought a refill for my perfume, which was pricey but should laste a few years, and we've spent quite a bit on eating out.  Ones of those times is when we went to see family, which also put up our fuel bill a little bit.  We did keep within our budget for groceries though, so I'm going to count that as a win.

On a plus we've managed to keep our own emergency funds where they are and I've caught up with my pension payments so I'll now be able to go back to £50 a week for the rest of the year.  I'm not going to say anything about the four months emergency fund though, which I'm just going to gloss over this month. 😂

In all honesty it's been a bit of a disaster month when it comes to money.  However, the Christmas shopping is now complete and the issues with the car fixed.  We're also not going to be travelling anywhere in December so it should be a much cheaper month then November.  Now we just need to start saving up our sinkings funds and four months savings again - oh joy.

October 2022 Budget

Well October shot by fast.  Is it really November all ready? At least things are starting to get back on track when it comes to our finances.

As always our own emergency funds and credit cards are where they need to be and we where able to put just over £700 into our four month emergency fund, which I'm very happy about. It might be building up slowly, but at least it is going up.

We did have a slight hiccup, especially one week where I forgot to take cash out so we used our cards instead, when it came to our groceries.  It definitely shows what a difference using cash instead of just swiping your card makes to how you spend your money.  The eating out is also connected to some family time and we're happy to spend money on that.  Despite that we have managed to mostly keep to our budget so I'm happy with it despite that.

One positive is that fuel has been been quite low this month, despite the actual cost of fuel not being, mainly because I haven't needed to drive as far for work this month.  We've also been pretty good on our spending, though again family time and there has been a start to Christmas shopping which does feel a little bit early but there we are.  My pension payments have been a little higher this month as I've been trying to catch up on that week I missed.  I should only have to do it for another month and then it can go back to normal.  Obviously I'll need to keep an eye on this though, as it may be that we just can't afford it.  

So October hasn't been quite as good as we could have made it, but still better than previous month's and we're getting onto the habits that will help us work better with our money.  Only a couple months to go now and, apart from a little long weekend we have planned, I plan for us to be well behaved on those months.

September 2022 Budget

It definitely feels like every month this year there has been something going on that has put a little spanner in our financial works.  This time I was ill...... again...... for about a week.  It was horrible and obviously stressful as, as someone who is self-employed, I can't earn any money when ill.  Not ideal, but it's also something we don't have any control over at the moment.  Hopefully the tests I'm getting done by the doctors will come up with something that we can then fix and then I can get on with my original life where I'm not ill on a monthly basis.

Due to the whole being ill thing I've had to move some more money over from the savings to help cover some of the bills that came out at the end of September before my husband's wage went in.  Not ideal, but that is what they are there for and I was able to put some money back once his pay arrived.  Thankfully we've both been able to hold onto our personal emgency funds and so we still have some added security for all the financial changes that are happening at the moment.

Despite all this I was still able to pay off my credit card and almost paid every week of my pension, bar one.  I'm still going to classify this as a win though as I didn't actually earn anything one week to pay it.  Once things have settled I will try and make up for that but I'm not going to worry about it too much, just concentrate on paying into my pension for the rest of the year.

We did decided to move our groceries spending to a cash system to help curve the amount we were actually spending on this and I have to say that it worked a treat.  We did spend a little more on the week I was ill as we were basically buying things that I could keep down, but we made up for this on the other weeks and have actually been under budget for September.  We've also been a lot more conscientious about our take-away / eating out budget and have come under budget on this as well.  This is all very good progress and has actually been quite painless to do.

We've also been a lot more careful about the money we spend in general on things we don't necessarily need and that has also brought our overall spending down in September.  And really it couldn't have come at a better time as things are progressively getting worse in Britain when it comes to our economy.  There's even talk about the possibility of us going into yet another recession, so this change in our financial habits couldn't come at a better time.  

September might not have been the month I was hoping for, but we've still managed to make changes to our spending habits that has saved us money and will follow into the next months, bringing us just a little bit closer to reaching our financial goals even in the financial climate we're in at the moment.

August 2022 Budget

I have to admit that I didn't really want to write this blog as we haven't done particularly  well this month at all.  We were already starting this month on the back foot we hadn't been able to build back up the baseline of our joint account to £1000 which covers our regular bills.  I also lost one weeks pay as we went on holiday this month.  Thankfully my husband still got paid for the days he took off, but it still made a noticeable difference not having that one payment.

The other thing was that, even though we knew that this month was going to be tight,  we still spent way more money than we should have done.  Ironically this wasn't actually during our holiday, as we had expected, but mostly on items that will allow us to do more free activities in the future.  Theoretically this is good, but maybe not for this month.

As I knew that the money would be low during our holiday I didn't pay one weeks pension or pay off some purchases I had made with my credit card.  Then there was the week I was off and not earning to I wasn't able to pay these again on that week.  I will need to find a way of catching back up on these two items and if I could do that by the end of September that would be very useful.

That being said, we haven't done too badly on the groceries and eating out spending which I was expecting to be much higher as we were on holiday.  Obviously the fuel was quite a bit more this month from all the driving we did when we were away.  We have still had to move money over from our savings again to help pay our standard bills, but this is a habit we really need to break.  However, by the end of the month we were able to bring the balance of our joint account back to where we want it and put just over £200 back into our savings.  Have to take the wins where we can.

Despite all this I don't regret us going on the holiday as we needed the break and we got to go to a place that I love and have a family connection to, but which Ed has never been to.  We also got to get in a great walk as well, but more on that in a future post.

However, it's now time to get serious again about our financial situation now.  We've known for a while now that it is pretty unlikely that we'll reach our savings goal by the end of this year and, if I'm being honest, that did dishearten me a little bit and put me into a 'why bother' mentality.  I did try and fight it, but sometimes you have to sit with those emotions for a bit to actually get through them.  Now the time for wallowing is over.  We may not reach our savings goal, but we can get closer to it and that's still a good thing to hold onto.  I also now made a visual representation of our savings that I can look at on a daily basis and that should also help.  So, bring on September and whatever that month has to throw at us.

June 2022 Budget

It almost feels like May was actually a turning point in our finances as June has actually gone pretty well.  This was even against the fact that June is actually quite a busy month birthday wise, so there's a lot of spending on presents and meals out.

Let's start with the usual.  Our credit cards and personal emergency funds are doing well and this is something we're going to aim to keep for the rest of the year.  

Because of how the months are running all the regular bills came out at the end of this month, just after my husband's pay day.  We've been able to build money up to cover these whilst keeping our standing balance in our joint account. Unfortunately we didn't get to put any money into our savings, but that should start again next month.

I've decided to add back the money we have in our joint account to our four months emergency fund as it's always something we're going to have to help out with the bills.  This means that the four month savings is now at £2522, which means we're about £80 of where we want to be half way through the year (something that my next pay with cover).  Hopefully we can put a good amount into this on a monthly basis now to reach the full savings by the end of the year.

I've managed to put money into my pension every week this month, which makes this the first month I've been able to do that on, and I'm very proud of that - go me. 💃

As I said before, we did spend quite a bit on eating out and birthday presents this month, but I did also get money for my birthday which I'm using to get the wool and fabric I need to make the clothes I want to make this year.  We are doing much better this month on spending less on food shops (including snacks we shouldn't really be buying both financial and for our health).  What has really gone up is, of course, the fuel, but there's nothing I can do about this as I need the car for work.  It is really making us think about getting a hybrid car sooner than originally planned though.

So this has been a pretty good month financially, despite all the little pitfalls, and that's made me very happy.  The plan is to keep this going for the rest of the year.  We might need to be a little stricter to actually reach these goals, but it's still a possibility.

May 2022 Budget

It's been a little while now since I've been able to say that our finances are going well, but finally we have a month were we can.  This has been partly helped by me doing my tax returns early this year (I put money aside after every pay to cover my taxes at the end of the financial year, but I don't usually have to send all of it to the HMRC), the £150 we all got back from our Council Tax, and my husband having a full time job again - at least for now.  So, we're making the most of it whilst we can.

Our credit cards and personal emergency funds are still going strong, and we've managed to put some more money into our savings account.  It looks really unlikely that we'll reach our goal saving half of this emergency fund by the end of June, but we did have to use the savings to cover our bills after Ed lost his job and that is exactly what this saving is for.

I did use some of my tax return money to catch up on my pension payments so that's now fully paid up to the end of May.  This makes me very happy.  I also used some of the money to get out joint account back up to cover next month's general bills, so that was another worry off mind as well.

We've been pretty good on our spending on food, takeaways/eating out, and general spending, though I did spend some money on replacing an items of Ed's which was very important to him but unfortunately broke.  We do need to keep on improving on this though if we're going to reach our savings goals for 2022.

So, everything went much better this month compared to April, or in fact March, and it definitely made me glad that I'd been sensible and put aside that money every pay day.   Though we are in a much better place at the moment with both of us working full time jobs, we are very aware that the cost of everything is going up still, in some cases by quite a lot, so we're going to need to be very careful with our spending from now.  This is especially true as all predictions show that it's only going to get worse as we move into winter - oh joy.  At least this month has been a win and has set us up nicely for the months to come.

April 2022 Budget

Our April finances have gone just as I was excepting based on my partner only having a part-time job at the moment and us both having some days off for the wedding and honeymoon (and by some I mean over a week).  This has meant that April is a month where there's been not a lot of money coming in and quite a bit of money going out.  

One win is that we've still managed to keep our credit cards at zero and keep our personal emergency funds fully funded.  As before, the car and Christmas sinking funds are still completely paid up, though we might need to eat more into our savings at the start of May.  Unfortunately we did have to take even more money out of our four months emergency fund in April to pay for bills and we haven't been able to pay it back yet.  Hopefully that'll be something we can achieve in the next few months.

It does look like nothing has come out of our account for rent, electricity, etc, but because of how the months fall this money actually came out at the end of March and this still had an impact on April.

Our spending on takeaways and additional spending is quite high this month, but I guess that's to be expected as we were away on our honeymoon.  We probably should have been a little more careful whilst we were away, but we wanted to enjoy ourselves and the time we had together.  We also knew we were going to have to be stritch once we got home.  I also didn't put any money into my pension as we didn't have the funds available, so I'll need to spend the rest of the year catching up on that -gulp.

I will be doing my tax returns at the start of next month so hopefully that'll give us a little extra money to put back into our savings or at least help out with all the bills for May and get things back on track.

So, not a particularly successful month, but not a surprising one either as we weren't really expecting to do well.  It would have been nice to put some money into savings and my pension, but I accept that wasn't possible this month what with us enjoying ourselves perhaps a little too much.  All I can say is bring on next month and being able to concentrate on our goals now that the wedding is over.

March 2022 Budget

Another month and another illness.  This time vomitting, for about a week.  I'm not sure why I keep getting I'll, but it's really not helping with the finances especially as my partner has been unemployed for most of this month.

Unfortunately, this has meant that we've had to take about £800 of our savings to cover our monthly expenses.  It's not good for us building up our savings, but that is what those savings are there for and I'm glad that we have it.  It's definitely made our lives less stressful so it's done it's job.  We have managed to put about £340 back in, but we still have a long way to go.  We've also managed to get our joint account back up to the our planned base, which we've struggled with before, and this should help us cover the main April bills.

This is the last month where we get a break from paying a Council Tax and Water Charges.  This has been a god send for these two months of me being ill.  Unfortunately this won't be the case as of this month so we need to plan for these.  March was also one of those months where all our general bills comes out twice, so it does look a little bit worse than it actually is.

I haven't been able to put the amount into my pension as I had planned either.  Just £200 instead of the £250.  This means that I'll need to increase my payments from now on to reach my yearly goal.  I'm not sure how well that's going to go as I do have a honeymoon coming up next month.

On the plus side, I've managed to pay off all of my credit card so we can put any spare money just into paying up our savings.  We haven't had to use any of our sinking funds as well, which I'm very happy about as the car has been a problem in the past.

We have been better at not spending as much money on takeaways, probably helped by the fact that I haven't been able to eat properly even after the illness had gone.  It's taken a while for my stomach to he able to take food again properly.  I suppose that sort of a good thing.  We've also been better at spending on just general things as well and hopefully we'll be able to keep this going from now on.

Thankfully we already have the wedding and honeymoon money in savings so we don't need to worry about that and can just enjoy those events without the stress of money.  However, we do still need to think about our spending and saving money as my partner won't be getting paid until the end of April, and only for about two weeks.

All that being said, under the circumstances of unemployment and illness we have done pretty well this month to have paid off debt and built up our joint account.  We could have done better and spent less than we did have, but I'm going to take this win.  Especially as I'm still struggling to eat properly at the moment so any win is good for me.  Fingers crossed April will go a little better.